# To non-native English speakers



## Autumn (Oct 12, 2011)

Do native speakers of your language screw up your language as often as native English speakers screw up their own language?


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## shy ♡ (Oct 12, 2011)

Yes.


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## I liek Squirtles (Oct 12, 2011)

Yes. There's sapnglish, so yeah. :P


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## opaltiger (Oct 12, 2011)

Kind of. Maybe not as badly as English.


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## Tailsy (Oct 12, 2011)

No, they're flawless.


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## Worst Username Ever (Oct 12, 2011)

When writing, yes, at times.


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## Aletheia (Oct 12, 2011)

Not as far as I've seen. Then again, the last time I heard a native German speaker was 4 years ago :P
(that and Germans are emotionless awe-inspiring creatures of perfection)


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## Shiny Grimer (Oct 12, 2011)

Depends on what you consider a mistake. We have to start by defining what it means to screw up one's own language. What is considered a "mistake" could just be a dialectal variation, or even the original version of the word (etymologically speaking, the word "ask" comes from ascian, which soon spawned the variation acsian. As such, pronouncing the work like "axe" is actually true to the word's origins!). What is the "correct" pronunciation of the word "chauffeur"? How big of a deal is the Oxford comma? Should we do away with the vestiges of the subjunctive, as many English have?

As a native speaker of Spanish, there are some very common spelling mistakes that are made. Most of the grammatical mistakes I hear are from speakers who haven't lived in a Spanish-speaking country for a very long time. There are also dialectal variations - according to me, people from Central America speak bizarrely and Cuban Spanish is the One True Spanish.


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## opaltiger (Oct 12, 2011)

> What is the "correct" pronunciation of the word "chauffeur"?


There's more than one? o.o


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## Shiny Grimer (Oct 12, 2011)

In the US: /ʃoʊˈfɜ˞/, (show-FER) /ˈʃoʊfə˞/ (SHOW-fer)
In the UK: /ʃɒˈfɜː/ (show-FEH) /ˈʃəʊfə/ (SHOW-fuh)

I grew up hearing only "show-FER," but I heard "SHOW-fer" in a few movies from the 70s. According to Alpha Dictionary, most people in the US use the "SHOW-fer" pronunciation, though I think it has grown increasingly rare as I have never heard anyone my age or below pronounce it like that.


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## Music Dragon (Oct 12, 2011)

Not sure about "as often", but it does happen a lot.


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## M&F (Oct 12, 2011)

Eh, it would be difficult to generalize. On one hand we have people who constantly make horrible mistakes, but on the other we have flawless speakers, and there's everything in between.


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## Tarvos (Oct 12, 2011)

Yes, they make tons of mistakes, particularly spelling mistakes - but Dutch is notorious for its awful spelling rules


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## Butterfree (Oct 13, 2011)

Yes.

Native Icelandic speakers are particularly prone to splitting up words that are supposed to be compound (probably a recent influence from English), spelling words that are supposed to have an i with a y (or í/ý) or the other way around (they're always pronounced identically in Icelandic), and using one n where there should be two or the other way around. Then there are various common mistakes in particular words, phrases, etc.


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## Lord of the Fireflies (Oct 13, 2011)

Yes.

But it's mostly due to grammatical idontgiveashit.


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## Dannichu (Oct 13, 2011)

... said:


> How big of a deal is the Oxford comma?









(I have been waiting for an excuse to use this picture for _the longest time_.)


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## bulbasaur (Oct 13, 2011)

Umm, in the second case you would just write "we invited the strippers JFK and Stalin" to prevent ambiguity.


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## ... (Oct 13, 2011)

Take a look at any Youtube video in any dialect of Spanish. Read a few of the comments. That _can't_ be considered a good representation of the Spanish language. This also applies for French, German, Italian, Filipino, or any other languages on pretty much any site where anyone can post or comment.


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## Negrek (Oct 13, 2011)

bulbasaur said:


> Umm, in the second case you would just write "we invited the strippers JFK and Stalin" to prevent ambiguity.


Except that "we invited the strippers JFK and Stalin" is incorrect because "JFK and Stalin" is an appositive. Needz moar comma.

Just say it aloud; if you speak English like anybody I've met, you pause naturally between "strippers" and "JFK."


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## bulbasaur (Oct 13, 2011)

Negrek said:


> Except that "we invited the strippers JFK and Stalin" is incorrect because "JFK and Stalin" is an appositive. Needz moar comma.
> 
> Just say it aloud; if you speak English like anybody I've met, you pause naturally between "strippers" and "JFK."


That depends on what message you're trying to convey; if you're referring to a group of strippers which consists entirely of JFK and Stalin, then, yeah, you'd need a comma. But if all you're trying to convey is that JFK and Stalin are strippers, and not the only strippers, then there should not be a comma, and this is by far the more common situation. I mean, life would suck if the only strippers were JFK and Stalin.


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## ultraviolet (Oct 13, 2011)

but neither of those is what's trying to be said; they want to invite the strippers _and_ JFK _and_ stalin. The joke is that without an oxford comma, it implies that the strippers _are_ JFK and stalin.


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## opaltiger (Oct 13, 2011)

bulbasaur said:


> Umm, in the second case you would just write "we invited the strippers JFK and Stalin" to prevent ambiguity.


... yes but that implies that you're /actually/ inviting JFK and Stalin as strippers. Whereas the point is that the second sentence is trying to say the same thing as the first, but failing because of the lack of Oxford comma.


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## Music Dragon (Oct 13, 2011)

Butterfree said:


> Native Icelandic speakers are particularly prone to splitting up words that are supposed to be compound (probably a recent influence from English)


We have that problem too, but I don't really think English is to blame so much as book covers, posters etc. where compound words are split over several lines (without hyphens) to fit better.

... That, plus a general fear of long words, maybe!


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## Tarvos (Oct 13, 2011)

Joining the compound word club...


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## Ether's Bane (Oct 13, 2011)

Back on topic:

Somewhat, but nowhere near as badly as they get English wrong.


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